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Re: "lier or a fool"

Originally Posted by wcubed

But nothing is gained by offering rebuttal. Neither of us would change our opinions.

Which opinion? I asked questions on facts that are unclear to me and provided some observations I made. I do not have opinions. Gave up on opinions, since their lifespan is short anyway. (At least if you have an open mind.)

I reckon you do no good to the checkerboarding as a system by interweaving mystic facts (read: cannot be proven) into it. I would drop those thoughts that "occured" to you suddenly. I do it all the time.

Re: "lier or a fool"

Originally Posted by Michael Palmer

You said..."One of the reasons for rejection of the concept is the appearence of other types of swarms, later."

What kinds of swarms would those be Walt? The ones that issue on the main flow or the fall flow? The..."we ran out of room and we bumped up against the limits of the capacity of our cavity just like we did in the spring when we bump up against a honey dome or the limits of our cavity cuz we live in a tree and no one has supered us or checkerboarded us" kind of swarm?

Are they really different? Why because you say they are? To me they are no different. Same as an earlier swarm, the bees ran out of overhead nectar storage...either because there was what you call a honey dome or they hit the top of their cavity...both of which lead to backfilling of the broodnest...which leads to swarm preparations...not the other way around. Doesn't matter if it's May or June or July or August.

Swarms in July ain't worth a fly, but they still swarm don't they. And in August. And sometimes September. But those don't count as what you call a repro swarm because they're different?

You said.."Just knowing when you are out of the woods on reproductive swarming is a work-saver."

Were the colonies that swarmed in July and August "out of the woods"?

Wait a minute. "Swarms in July aren't worth a fly" But I thought you just got through saying you see no difference in an early mid or late season swarm? How can there possible be a better or worse swarm if there is no difference? I see this as a serious contradiction and a blatant admission your part that is fact there is a difference. Now the issue is what are those differences.

Here is my thinking on it. any swarm that is not Reproductive period swarm which is a term created by Walt defined by him and is not debatable. It also clearly has an end I have seen it myself and the fact that swarming can be prevented confirms. I will choose to call it early season swarming as opposed to mid or late season cast offs. From what I have seen it is clearly different. in fact from what I have seen I do not consider mid or late season swarms swarms at all. I consider them funeral processions. I do not consider them attempts to reproduce in any manner. I consider them one of the bees methods of disposing of an undesirable queen. I also consider this a considerable difference than what takes place at early season which is a strong robust swarm capable of thriving and resulting in a new colony. An early season swarm and I have seen plenty of them has a queen that quickly builds a brood nest and bees that draw comb at an extraordinary rate. later season swarms even by a few weeks do not have either. they do not build frames of comb they built tiny patches of it. the queen does not fill frames with brood she would barely fill up the skin of a baseball. More interesting than that no attempt is made to replace her even though bees may have nearly an entire season to do so. they will even survive winter. I know this for a fact. and still no attempt to replace her. This all appears to me that any mid or later season swarm is nothing but a cast of of a failing queen and her escort. destined to die and with no intention of preventing that.

Re: "lier or a fool"

Daniel, you make some good points about later season swarms, but do you think their lack of instinctive ambition could be directly related to them having to construct the new nest during the time of the season that is less than ideal as far as incoming nectar and pollen sources? As you say, even 2-3 weeks between different swarms indicates a difference in how those two swarms approach building up going forward. Could it be that the availability of large amounts of pollen and nectar early, followed closely by a noticeable (as far as the bees are concerned) decrease in those incoming resources, is what defines the two kinds of swarming impulses and the industriousness of those two different swarms?

Re: "lier or a fool"

Originally Posted by Daniel Y

Wait a minute. "Swarms in July aren't worth a fly" But I thought you just got through saying you see no difference in an early mid or late season swarm? How can there possible be a better or worse swarm if there is no difference? I see this as a serious contradiction and a blatant admission your part that is fact there is a difference. Now the issue is what are those differences.

Serious contradiction, and blatant admission Daniel? Whoa man, back up. You misunderstand what I'm saying, or I wasn't clear. I apologize for getting you wound up. Let me make what I said clearer...

I was saying that the REASON for the issuance of prime swarms was the same, not the quality, or performance, or their ability to build up for winter was the same. Yes, late swarms can be called funeral processions if you like, but do you really think the bees are swarming just to die, and if late enough in the season, to kill the parent colony because it can't winter? I doubt you do. So if you don't, please tell me...why did the colony issue a prime swarm so late in the season. That's what I'm asking both you and Walt.

Re: "lier or a fool"

Originally Posted by jmgi

Daniel, you make some good points about later season swarms, but do you think their lack of instinctive ambition could be directly related to them having to construct the new nest during the time of the season that is less than ideal as far as incoming nectar and pollen sources?

Re: "lier or a fool"

Jmgi.
in the case of my first swarm absolutely not. it came barely after what should have been the swarm season proper. and it never made any attempt at a significant build up even though it was hived in early June, it was still prime flow they all the way into November or further to avail themselves of forage and never did. Our last flow begins after first frost here. In the spring while all other hives where well into build up this hive never made any attempt. once I obtained cells from other hives that did attempt to swarm I requeened it. and it took right off. The overall impression to me was this hive had no intention of surviving.

Michael. I used the words Serious and Blatant because I consider them accurate as to what I see.

I am aware of claims of late season swarm that is caused by crowding but I have never seen one. Also the exact cause of these swarms seems to be a bit fuzzy. first it seems that crowding is the accepted cause yet other information indicates it would be extremely difficult to get a hive so crowded that it would swarm. Without seeing one for myself I cannot form my own conclusions.

As for what I have seen. Do I think these bees left for no other reason than to die? Yes. I have observed myself that there is no effort on the swarms part to survive, not in spring, summer fall winter or returning to spring surviving right through build up into the start of the main flow for a second time until they eventually where re queened.

In all it built up to 5 small pieces of comb. then just went stagnant and eventually fell back to a cluster no bigger than a baseball with a walnut size area of brood at best.

I am now seeing the same thing in a swarm we caught late season last year. I do not intend to give it nearly a full year to see what it does.

It first accoured to me that maybe these bees where a cluster waiting to die one day when I checked on them and actually said out loud. these bees are determined to die. I then sort of went with the default conclusion of. the most obvious answer is most likely the correct one. For me they do not act like swarms so I do not consider them swarms. just what they are. well that is my best guess.

Re: "lier or a fool"

Daniel, I have to say that in all the years I have had bees, I don't recall ever hiving a swarm during the swarm season and not have it build up normally like you would expect. I don't know why an early swarm like you had would just stagnate like that unless the queen was burned out.

Re: "lier or a fool"

I'll have to agree with jmgi. Daniel, I think what you are experiencing with your swarms is the exception rather than the rule. I've hived a lot of swarms over the years, some were in July. I've never had a swarm shut down as you describe. They might run out of time to prepare properly for winter, but I've never had any kamikaze swarms that I can recall.

I don't have the answers, but my gut and personal experience tells me that mid to late season swarms are not all suicide flights.

Re: "lier or a fool"

It still does not explain that then never attempted to supersede a queen if in fact she was just a failing queen. It woudl be expected that any swarm that leaves with the old queen will supersede her. or so I have heard. The only reason let this hive go so long was that one it was my first swarm. and second it was in my top bar hive and I really didn't care much what happened to it. I suppose ti is possible that the colony never got strong enough to attempt a supercedure. except they did not start out exactly small. they where not huge but it was not a tiny swarm by any means.

jmgi, keep in mind I do not consider this a swarm that was during normal swarm season. I am not sure if you mean any time a swarm might normally issue. but that distinction is actually what this conversation is about. I consider swarm period as that period defined by Walt as Repro Swarm period and am presenting the possibility that any thing mistaken as a swarm at any other time is in fact not a swarm but a function of some other purpose.

Re: "lier or a fool"

Ace, I saw the queen frequently over nearly a years time. She did produce brood just not a lot of it. It was not drone brood so she was not infertile. I am not sure poor mating results in less laying just more laying of drones. But she should still have laid a decent nest even if it was all drone. She simply did not lay much and none of the bees seemed to think they should do anything about it.

I have heard in the past that if bees are placed in to large of a space it can demoralize them. that was what I thought i was seeing at first. But over time I started getting the impression they where determined to just die.

Re: "lier or a fool"

Daniel, I was referring to the typical swarm season for me here in my area, which is May-June time frame. I do understand what you are referring to also about swarms after the "reproductive swarm period", but I don't understand how you are so sure that this particular swarm you spoke about earlier is not of the reproductive kind, you said it occured "barely" after the normal swarm time. I don't know if I would classify it as something other than a repro swarm just because it didn't build up normally as you would expect a prime swarm to do. Also, expecting a swarm to supercede a failing or old queen, if indeed it was, is not something I would bet on either. Bees sometimes will not supercede a queen that appears to us to be failing, and will supercede one that looks very prolific to us, I'm sure you have heard that saying before.

Re: "lier or a fool"

Originally Posted by Daniel Y

I consider swarm period as that period defined by Walt as Repro Swarm period and am presenting the possibility that any thing mistaken as a swarm at any other time is in fact not a swarm but a function of some other purpose.

Re: "lier or a fool"

jmgi, I do not consider that swarm a Repro swarm for no other reason than it did not act like one. As for the repro swarm period. At the time I captured the swarm I had no idea if it was swarm season or not. at that time I thought any time was swarm season. I was aware the spring was the main period of time for swarming. Based upon my tracking of the swarm period the following year it would have been from April 14th to just about the beginning of the last week in May. I woudl have to look up what date I got my last swarm call. In all I captured some 13 swarms. all of them thriving types. The swarm in question had been captured the previous year in the second week of June. I agree that is a short separation of time. but it is a separation of time. I do have further question of whether this first year swarm was actually cast in the Repro period because year two was an early year by quite a bit. The only thing I can add to the information about season one is that another beekeeper was able to put together and get built up a 5 frame nuc for me and had it to me on May 10th. That to me seems pretty consistent with the same sort of swarm period. if he had queens to make a nuc from I suspect they got started at or near that mid April mark. maybe even a bit sooner. I cannot say if the queen had been an over wintered one or not.

Ace, I did pinch her in the end. and pretty much as soon as I had queens to replace her with. Keep in mind I near had anything to compare this swarm to until the following spring when I started capturing other swarms. it was then that I got swarm after swarm that behaved entirely differently . building up to colonies that actually produced a little bit of honey. one of them later attempting to swarm again. So the entire picture did not come together for me for quite a while.

Michael. to cast off an undesirable queen. Either the colony pushed her out or she chose to leave on her own would be my guess. I suspect that is only one guess among many hundreds and the odds of it being correct are almost non existent.
Not knowing exactly what the difference is does not mean there is no difference. certainly not when a difference can bee seen.

Re: "lier or a fool"

Originally Posted by Daniel Y

Either the colony pushed her out or she chose to leave on her own would be my guess.

So far what I have read about bees the queen decides nothing. Certainly there is a difference between a repo swarm and a supercedure which is not a swarm at all. The bees don't leave. But when some of the bees do leave (with a queen) and it is a swarm, what is the difference regardless of when it happens?

Re: "lier or a fool"

Originally Posted by Acebird

I would like to ask at this point how does a colony know whether their queen is any good or not when they all came from that queen?

I have no idea what they know or why they know it. How do they decide to supersede the queen? I suspect that casting off a queen may very well be just another way the bees dispose of a queen they have chosen to replace. I have also seen where they do not get rid of the old queen at all. so I know the details of replacing a queen vary.